With the passing of a few more minutes, Anya had already managed to gulp down multiple of her specialty drink, being in an absolutely foul state. She slurred her words with every sentence, she got angry and then happy, all the while the barkeeper was the only one at her company.
"And like, this magic talking book of bullshit made me a furry by some Obsulyte magic and shit...", she had a hiccup, "It's garbage, like my life."
"Umm...Anya I...I think it's time to stop." he tried pulling the drink away from her.
She violently shook off his arm from her drink, "Get off! You're gonna take that away from me too?! Piss off!"
All the eyes of the bar's guests shifted onto them, the barman calmly moving away and lifting his arms up, trying to calm the situation as much as he could. A man sitting next to Anya tried to figure out exactly what was going on.
"Umm...a little bit too much, perhaps?" the man asked.
"Uh-Yeah. Sorry sir, I'll handle her a bit.", the barman apologized, "Anya, please, people are looking.", he whispered to her.
"Screw them! The people look at me because of this disgusting body! Dante is a goddamn liar! A liar! He too gives me weird looks, I know it! He bullshitted me about that whole 'Oh, your friends will love you regardless of what you look', what a load of bullshit! Look at me...look at me! A disgusting, hair-filled, furry monstrosity that no one can even look in the eyes. Look at me! Look! Look!", she teared up as she saw her reflection in one of the almost empty glasses in front of her, "Screw you!"
As she lodged the glass forward, it shattering to bits and splashing the remaining drink onto the nearby man.
"I-I am so, so sorry sir! Please, uh, follow my colleague, he will get you all cleaned up in the bathroom!", the barman quickly apologized.
"No problem, just an alcohol stain. At least this lady's taste is good, so it smells amazing.", the man tried to humor the bad situation.
As he left to get cleaned, the barman having enough, he turned around, this time with an angry look at Anya, quickly putting away all the remaining glasses.
"Ok, that's it, Anya! I'm calling your dad!" the barman threatened her.
"No! No, no, no!" Anya grabbed the barman, "He will kill them! He will kill them all!"
The barman pushed her away, "What the hell are you talking about? If not your dad, I'm calling Magi. I'm sorry, but no way in hell I'll let this keep going on!"
The barman left to the nearby office room to get hold of the phone, leaving behind Anya with the last, half-filled glass of her drink in her hand. She stopped being angry and sad, instead going back to calming down and looking around the bar. Everyone, not a single person excluded, was eyeing her. And how could they not? She was a clear and easy target. A body, that of a beast, huge tail and ears covering her head and the seat below her. Giant arms, muscular that didn't show a sign of her old humanity. She was a monster.
She turned back at her drink, playing with her glass, "I'm...ugly now. I'm a monster like dad..."
She briefly forgot her situation from a beep on her phone. The timer she set upon the doctor's orders began to ring, signifying the time she set was up.
"Well...shit."
She reached into her bag, taking out the bottle of painkillers provided to her, 2 as instructed in one hand and drink in the other, putting the bottle back in her bag. She looked at her reflection in the mirror behind the bar, showing her form in full view.
"To my lying best friend, who calmed me by speaking mere bullshit, and all the dumb, depressing pieces of shit the clown show our crew is.", she made a toast to herself.
She proceeded take her pills by gulping down the entire other half of her remaining drink, something she thought would ease the pain. She then dropped back down on both her hands, tearing up over whatever came through her mind. A few moments later, the barman came back to find Anya in a dormant state.
"Hey...glad you calmed down. Magi is out of the city on business, but she said to take every measure necessary so...yeah. Are you feeling better?
"Mmm.." Anya felt drowsy, not listening to the barman.
"Hey, Anya, you there?"
Anya did not respond, as her eyes felt heavy. Too heavy. Just then, as she got up to leave, Gado walked through the door, looking right at her. Unable to believe it, Anya was left stunned before him.
"Miserable creature. I should've just done my plan on Misha instead."
"What...the hell?"
Before she could act, Gado came out of the bathroom, again looking straight at Anya.
"You wanted this, but just had to deny it by acting rebellious and playing the heroic defender."
"What the hell do you want?!" Anya screamed.
The barman intervened, "Hey, Anya, relax! It's just a customer!" he tried to calm her down.
Anya then dropped from her chair, lying down on the floor as she looked up at the rest of the bar. Gado was sitting on the table in front of her. And the table behind that. And the one on the left. All 13 of them gathered in one place. They all began to barrage her in an almost rhythmic manner.
"You just stuck with Dante because he was the same as you. Though...he wanted to do what he was being taught to do."
"Had it not been for you imitating him because you couldn't find your own way, and bottling it all up by taking the example from him while hypocritically suggesting he did otherwise, you could've made this 10 times less impactful than it is."
"Maria's burned arms are on you!"
"Dante killed his own mother, and you made yours disappear. You always knew deep inside that it was your fault. You just lie to yourself that you understand each other to hide how you don't truly belong to either your family or them."
"You can't even admit that you're hanging out with a murderer, just because you wish that it'll take you back to the childhood you didn't even try to save."
"You will end up exactly like me. It's only a matter of time, and you know it."
"You will push everyone away from you, exactly like him, because you both know how unbelievably bad of a person your real selves are."
"Drinking makes you think you become cool, only to further hurt and bring others, even those people they never once asked you if you wanted to be their friend, in awkward situations."
"Terna was a singer, Tiki was a general, Dante was a skilled leader and Luna is flawless. What have you ever been? Just taking what empire I set up for you. Daddy's girl."
"You know how toxic of a person Dante truly is, but you're willing to blind yourself just to hang on to false hope."
"You bring nothing other than money to the entire team. Hell, that's the only reason you thought they made you their friend when you injected yourself in their team. Just for the money...which you don't have anymore."
"You loved the old city. You loved the old innocent times. You loved her. And you will never admit how Dante took that all away, simply patting his head over a lie you tell both to yourself and him."
"You're the odd one out, yet you shoved yourself inside the group just to get away from your problems again, not even thinking what those behind you would suffer. Do it again. Run away."
They all started provoking her, yelling "Run, run, run." again and again, each time their voice becoming increasingly louder with every single echoing of the word. Terrified, Anya screamed at the top of her lungs, completely lost in her surroundings. She quickly got off the floor and started running down the street, thankfully almost empty from the late hours to avoid further public detection than the few night goers.
"Anya! Anya!" the barman yelled, "I'm calling the Paladins on Magi's orders!"
Just then, the young man from the bathroom grabbed the barman from his arm and stopped him.
This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.
"Paladins who?" the man said.
"The Paladins that her friend is in charge of! She needs help, she's clearly out of it!"
"So, your friend right here. Has she always been like this?"
"What do you mean?"
"About 2 meters tall, filled with fur and a huge tail?"
"N-No..."
"So those Paladins? Are they informed of her transformation to be able to recognize her?"
"No...the police! I'll call the police!"
"I doubt that the police officers, who are so prone to violence might I add, will even bother to ID her once they get their hands on her person. If anything, I think your friend will become more of a living piñata for their fancy batons."
"What should I do, what should I do?! Sonia and Nikki, perhaps? I hope that at least Nikki is in the city to be able to pin her down, Anya has always been strong in terms of muscles...", the barman panicked.
"Alright, alright. Calm down. I'll handle this. Ah, what was her tab and mine combined? Not about to cause another commotion due to theft."
"Nothing, and I don't care about my boss. Just...if you can, make sure Anya is safe. That girl has been...she talked over a lot of things while being here with Magi."
"I will, no need to worry about that."
"Thank you...say, why are you doing all this? I mean...with how Anya looks like now, I expected something...bad."
The man turned around to the onlookers, them being completely stationary on their table seats and not acting at all, instead just being mere spectators of the situation and avoiding all involvement.
"I just want to know if any of you helped when I was in there cleaning up. Rather, I do enjoy the aroma of the drink, but soggy clothes aren't fun for everyone.", he looked at a fairly young man, knowing he was ID'd to enter the bar, "You there, can you tell me, please?"
The young man briefly paused, him being completely detached from the situation before he was directly asked to take part, "No...why should we?", he calmly, almost coldly said.
The man calmly picked up Anya's bag, closing the zip and respecting her privacy, then turning around to face the entirety of the spectators.
"Let me answer you with my question. A man gets involved into an accident and needs medical attention. Would you leave them unattended, or not call for help?"
"Is that even a question? Help." the barman answered before the men.
"Swap the man for a dog, cat or any animal companion that one would choose to coexist with. Anything changed, other than the form of help that would need to be provided? Suffice to say, it'll also be a 'No, nothing changed.', right? Taking it a step further, in this world we live in today, human-animal hybrids are swapped next. Answer remains the same, correct?"
The young man stuttered, "I-I...yes."
"Easy choice, right? You don't sacrifice anything, and you only wish to help. Now let me ask you this. 'Anya' as you call her and 'Ana' as I will, in this form...actually, no. Anyone in this form? The big feral and furry people. Do they breathe? Do they have a need to reproduce? Need to move, respond to the environment around them and be dependent on that environment? I'd say also yes, as that's the factual truth, right? So why don't you see that, when they are not even harming anyone to begin with, these 'feral monsters' are also people? Especially when their intelligence is more than human-like? Just like you and me. Though, given humanity's track record, you'd always rather shoot what you are afraid of first, than study the corpse after. What troubles me more is your age, young man. Not because you're drinking, far from it, I already know you had to provide your ID to even enter this place...but your words are so corrupt by the world already? Same old story, I guess...well then. Enough contemplating and life lessons, you're all adults who know the truth at the core and refuse it anyway and I don't want to ruin the night for all of you not-so-gentle-men, so I'll leave you to get drunk and move along. So long.", he took his leave.
The other patrons started talking among themselves almost instantly after the man finished his answering, voices raising higher and higher as offensive wording was exchanged between them all. Though furious at the man's answer, they did not even dare to jump at him, instead somewhat calming themselves out of sheer fear after even thinking of doing so. Sudden as it was, it was just one mean look from the man before they were just forced to a halt...for what they feared, only they knew, the menacing aura setting in faster than the falling rain and setting better than the winter snow. The man nodded, grabbed his jacket and walked out of the bar, going after Anya, walking calmly and slowly. Anya left behind a trail of destruction with surprised bystanders, dropped trash bins and what appeared to be blood, making it easy for him to track her down. Going down the trail, he began catching up to Anya rather fast, as he saw less and less destruction in his way.
He calmly hummed along his way, "Ah, there we go. Hmm?"
When he found Anya, he paused at the sight of her in the state she was. She had fainted on a bench, completely unaware and oblivious to all sounds around her. Blood drooled from her nose as a big, shadowy figure approached her from behind. The man softly put the bag beside him, fixing his jacket on his body and walking forward, hands in his jean's pockets as he got closer towards the figure.
"Alright, buddy, time to step away from the pretty girl over there."
As he came closer and closer to the shadowy figure, it walked the same way, revealing itself to be a woman's figure, wearing a mask that covered her identity, and holding what appeared to be a pair of small blades.
The man smiled and laughed briefly, not in a condescending but rather playful way as if he was kneeling to talk to a small child, "Oh, ok. I don't really know what you're up to, but that's a cool costume you got there. Makes you look like a main character in one of the many comics and mangas I've read. Now better get back to your cosplay event."
The figure stood tall beside Anya, taking an awkward stance that didn't let the man know if she was being actively hostile, or standing down. Still, he walked right up to her and took a good look at the mask. He then turned around to face Anya, reaching his hand out to help her. The woman then swiftly hammered down her arm with all her force, landing a direct hit on the man's arm. Nothing. Not a single scratch on him.
"I really don't want to make a move here, so I'll just be taking care of this one.", he politely said, making another move at Anya.
The woman then started landing multiple blows on the man, but not randomly. All the blows, despite being ineffective, landed almost perfectly on critical points, behind and at the front of his neck, near joints on his hands, before she tried stabbing him in the eyes, which also failed.
"So...we done?" the man still calmly said, being somewhat annoyed but still polite as ever, wondering if she had enough.
She then crossed her blades once again and aimed directly for the man's heart. This time, however, the man swiftly grabbed both of the blades from their sharp end with both his hands, managing to stop the woman.
"Yeah, all's well until you do that. Skin is ok but come on, why slash my clothes like that? Not like I have a wardrobe full of the same outfit, but I like these ones and especially the jacket.", he politely and softly pushed her away.
The woman then, avoiding irritation from his constant polite manner despite the situation and having both her arms stuck, did one last resort and tried to land a powerful blow with her left leg on the man's no-no square. It too, ended in futility.
"Alright, let me give it to you straight then."
The man then closed both his legs, trapping the woman's leg between them and slid his arm down from the edge of the two blades to her hands. As he began squeezing her hands, she was forced to let go of both her swords, before the man let go of her leg, turned around and slammed her down behind him on the floor. Still conscious, the woman then came face to face with the man standing above her.
"Look, I'm here to take care of this one too. I can tell you want the same, since you didn't blindly attack her or me when you appeared. Now can you cut it out? It's my shift to handle her. Off you go."
The woman swiftly got up, grabbed both her weapons and got back on her feet again. She took a look at Anya, before taking another look at the man, then jumped on the rooftop of a nearby building complex, reaching the top by jumping from wall to wall. The man looked at her standing before the moon as she gazed over the shoulder at them both, disappearing into the night. The man then turned around and walked up to Anya, grabbing and putting her bag besides her.
"Yeah...not your most attractive position." he looked at Anya while she was crashed down on the bench, "Here we go."
He fixed up Anya's position, gathering her hands and legs together before laying his jacket on top of her and resting beside her. Nothing else unfortunate befell them for the night, as Anya rested, snoring away, while he simply took out his phone to pass the time and looked around for any trouble. He wiped the running blood off her nose and the fur on her face, letting her instead loudly snore and dream herself off. Being happy that he didn't have to endure any comments about her or complains because of her loud snoring, he saw nearby workers coming to open what looked like a coffee store in front of him, not even realizing how the hours passed before he went to get himself something to drink while eyeing Anya to make sure she's safe in the process.
As the sun began to rise, he got up and started moving around in the other nearby freshly opened stores, always keeping an eye on Anya while browsing out of boredom. When morning finally came at its high and the sunlight began hitting the small plaza and Anya's face, she started to struggle as she woke up, grabbing her head almost immediately.
"Ah...oh man. Damn..." she rubbed her head, "What the...hell?"
She looked around, trying to figure out where she was. She felt the jacket on her, pushing it away as she started being even more confused. The man then walked up to her, having two more coffees in his hands.
"Oh, hey. Good morning! Got you a little something here. Drink up, the perfect thing for you after a long night of...well, unwise decisions."
Anya got up and put the jacket on the side, "Uh...thanks. So...who are you?"
"Some guy who helped you last night. Lots of things happened, I'm pretty sure you hallucinated in the bar after you started screaming for no reason, I followed you from a trail of blood coming from your nose, got my family kicked by a weird ninja lady and morning came."
"Uh..." Anya awkwardly looked at him.
"No, you and I are sober. Just that you have a raging headache. Drink up, it'll make you feel better."
"Yeah, I'm well aware and accustomed to that. God damn..." She rubbed her head as she drank her coffee.
The man sat beside her, "You must've been in a god-awful situation. I don't think I've seen anyone hallucinating that bad with just alcohol."
"The fact that I'm in the shit, I know. What I did last night, my memory stops before I entered the bar. 10 in the morning, huh?" she checked her phone, "Damn...so many messages. Someone notified Magi about the drinking...I'll have to get back to them soon enough. Gotta get the hell out of the city as fast as I can by tonight."
"Your friends? Yeah, probably. Though why in such a hurry?"
"Personal problems."
"Everybody's got those. Do enjoy the day before you go, though. It's the perfect sunny sky with no clouds. At times like these, it's such a waste to let this day go."
"Yeah, I was planning on some things anyway. Thanks for whatever you did last night...given how my bag's still here, you covered me with your jacked and all. Could've run away, especially now that I'm...like this."
"You look like another sensible and vocal being to me. I can sit around and wait for you to get up fully. Don't really have much else to do."
"Yeah...thanks again. Hey, uh...didn't catch your name. Sorry if you said it before and I didn't hear it, I'm still a bit off."
"Heheh. No problem." the man extended his hand, waiting for a handshake, "Already know your name, Ana, so don't worry."
"Surprised about that, though I'm sure my name must've slipped out in the bar last night...hopefully only to you." Anya grabbed his hand back, returning the handshake.
"It did, only to me. And in any case, the name is Kikaro."